In the News – 12 Year Old Girl’s Battle with Alopecia

Snippet from the article:

When football fanatic Sophie Nixon started losing clumps of her hair, no one in her family knew that bullying at school was making the youngster ill. Now the 12-year-old from Lowestoft has spoken out about her alopecia to encourage other young people to seek help if they are being bullied.

Sophie’s hair started falling out two years ago and she soon lost her eyebrows and eyelashes. It was only when her parents took her to see a doctor that she told them she was being teased at school and she was diagnosed with the condition, which causes sudden hair loss.

Read the full article at the UK’s East Anglian Daily Times.

She’s quite brave to speak out about her condition and I wish her well. This story reminded me of an article from a couple years ago, where a young girl’s hair loss was triggered by bullying (see here).

There are genetic disorders that cause hair loss at the young age, starting at 2-4 years old. This can be alopecia totalis or a form of ectodermal dysplasia, which are often genetic in origin.